In The Next 100 Years, Friedman turns his eye on the future. Drawing on a profound understanding of history and geopolitical patterns dating back to the Roman Empire, he shows that we are now, for the first time in half a millennium, experiencing the dawn of a new historical cycle.

The Next Decade: Where We've Been . . . and Where We're Going

In The Next Decade, George Friedman offers readers a pro­vocative and endlessly fascinating prognosis for the immedi­ate future. Using Machiavelli’s The Prince as a model, Friedman focuses on the world’s leaders - particularly the American president - and with his trusted geopolitical insight analyzes the complex chess game they will all have to play.

Currency Wars: The Making of the Next Global Crises

In 1971, President Nixon imposed national price controls and took the United States off the gold standard, an extreme measure intended to end an ongoing currency war that had destroyed faith in the U.S. dollar. Today we are engaged in a new currency war, and this time the consequences will be far worse than those that confronted Nixon. Currency wars are one of the most destructive and feared outcomes in international economics.

23 Things They Don't Tell You about Capitalism

If you've wondered how we did not see the economic collapse coming, Ha-Joon Chang knows the answer: We didn't ask what they didn't tell us about capitalism. This is a lighthearted book with a serious purpose: to question the assumptions behind the dogma and sheer hype that the dominant school of neoliberal economists-the apostles of the freemarket-have spun since the Age of Reagan.

Code Red: How to Protect Your Savings from the Coming Crisis

Written by the New York Times best-selling author team of John Mauldin and Jonathan Tepper, Code Red spills the beans on the central banks in the U.S., U.K., E.U., and Japan and how they've rigged the game against the average saver and investor. More importantly, it shows you how to protect your hard-earned cash from the bankers' disastrous monetary policies and how to come out a winner in the irresponsible game of chicken they're playing with the global financial system.

The Secret Life of the Grown-Up Brain: The Surprising Talents of the Middle-Aged Mind

A leading science writer examines how the brain's capacity reaches its peak in middle ageFor many years, scientists thought that the human brain simply decayed over time and its dying cells led to memory slips, fuzzy logic, negative thinking, and even depression.

Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think

We will soon be able to meet and exceed the basic needs of every man, woman, and child on the planet. Abundance for all is within our grasp. This bold, contrarian view, backed up by exhaustive research, introduces our near-term future, where exponentially growing technologies and three other powerful forces are conspiring to better the lives of billions of people. This book is an antidote to pessimism by tech-entrepreneur-turned-philanthropist Peter H. Diamandis and award-winning science writer Steven Kotler.

What Einstein Told His Cook: Kitchen Science Explained

Why is red meat red? How do they decaffeinate coffee? Do you wish you understood the science of food but don't want to plow through dry, technical books? In What Einstein Told His Cook, University of Pittsburgh chemistry professor emeritus and award-winning Washington Post food columnist Robert L. Wolke provides reliable and witty explanations for your most burning food questions, while debunking misconceptions and helping you interpret confusing advertising and labeling.

How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It: Tactics, Techniques and Technologies for Uncertain Things

James Wesley Rawles, founder of survivalblog.com, shares with you everything you need to know to be ready for the worst. The book includes information on proper food storage and sanitation, gardening and livestock basics, investment strategies to protect your assets, medical advice, communication techniques, home security, and how to get "outta Dodge" when, in the parlance of the movement, "the shit hits the fan".

Flashpoints: The Emerging Crisis in Europe

George Friedman has forecasted the coming trends (politics, technology, population, and culture) of the next century in The Next 100 Years, and focused his predictions on the coming ten years in The Next Decade. Now, in Flashpoints, Friedman zooms in on the region that has, for 500 years, been the cultural hotbed of the world - Europe - and examines the most basic and fascinating building block of the region: culture.

The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives

In this irreverent and illuminating audiobook, acclaimed writer and scientist Leonard Mlodinow shows us how randomness, chance, and probability reveal a tremendous amount about our daily lives, and how we misunderstand the significance of everything from a casual conversation to a major financial setback. As a result, successes and failures in life are often attributed to clear and obvious causes, when in actuality they are more profoundly influenced by chance.

Atomic Accidents: A History of Nuclear Meltdowns and Disasters; From the Ozark Mountains to Fukushima

From the moment radiation was discovered in the late nineteenth century, nuclear science has had a rich history of innovative scientific exploration and discovery, coupled with mistakes, accidents, and downright disasters.

The Locust Effect: Why the End of Poverty Requires the End of Violence

While the world has made encouraging strides in the fight against global poverty, there is a hidden crisis silently undermining our best efforts to help the poor. It is a plague of everyday violence. Beneath the surface of the world’s poorest communities, common violence—like rape, forced labor, illegal detention, land theft, police abuse and other brutality—has become routine and relentless. And like a horde of locusts devouring everything in their path, the unchecked plague of violence ruins lives, blocks the road out of poverty, and undercuts development.

Naked Statistics: Stripping the Dread from the Data

From batting averages and political polls to game shows and medical research, the real-world application of statistics continues to grow by leaps and bounds. How can we catch schools that cheat on standardized tests? How does Netflix know which movies you'll like? What is causing the rising incidence of autism? As best-selling author Charles Wheelan shows us in Naked Statistics, the right data and a few well-chosen statistical tools can help us answer these questions and more.

The Brain That Changes Itself: Personal Triumphs from the Frontiers of Brain Science

In this revolutionary look at the brain, best-selling author, psychiatrist, and psychoanalyst Norman Doidge, M.D., introduces both the brilliant scientists championing this new science of neuroplasticity and the astonishing progress of the people whose lives they've transformed.

Introducing principles we can all use, as well as a riveting collection of case histories, The Brain That Changes Itself has "implications for all human beings, not to mention human culture, human learning and human history."

How the Stock Market Works

This course is an introduction to the stock market and stock investing for novices and experienced investors alike. Professor DeGennaro uses simple analogies to explain the origin of stocks and other securities, as well as their relative risks. He stresses the danger of trying to beat the market by trying to pick winners, predict price trends, or otherwise find opportunities that other investors have missed.

Aftershock: Protect Yourself and Profit in the Next Global Financial Meltdown

While the "experts" want us to believe that all is well (or will be soon), nothing could be further from the truth. The worldwide financial crisis of 2008 and 2009 was just a sneak preview of what is to come. But for those who act quickly and correctly, there is still time to protect yourself, your family, and your business in the next global money meltdown.

David M. Weprin says:"Interesting, convincing, and well narrated advert."

Capital in the Twenty-First Century

What are the grand dynamics that drive the accumulation and distribution of capital? Questions about the long-term evolution of inequality, the concentration of wealth, and the prospects for economic growth lie at the heart of political economy. But satisfactory answers have been hard to find for lack of adequate data and clear guiding theories.

America's Secret War: Inside the Struggle Between the United States and Its Enemies

Dubbed by Barron's as "The Shadow CIA", Stratfor, George Friedman's global intelligence company, has provided analysis to Fortune 500 companies, news outlets, and even the U.S. government. Now Friedman delivers the geopolitical story that the mainstream media has been unable to uncover, the startling truth behind America's foreign policy and war effort in Afghanistan, Iraq, and beyond.

Boys Adrift: Factors Driving the Epidemic of Unmotivated Boys and Underachieving Young Men

Something scary is happening to boys today. From kindergarten to college, they are less resilient and less ambitious than they were a mere 20 years ago. Fully one-third of men ages 22 to 34 are still living at home with their parents, about a 100 percent increase in the past 20 years. Boys nationwide are increasingly dropping out of school; fewer are going to college. Family physician and research psychologist Dr. Leonard Sax presents practical solutions.

Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets

This audiobook is about luck, or more precisely, how we perceive and deal with luck in life and business. It is already a landmark work, and its title has entered our vocabulary. In its second edition, Fooled by Randomness is now a cornerstone for anyone interested in random outcomes.

Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs

In The Innovation Secrets of Steve Jobs, best-selling author Carmine Gallo reveals the qualities that make the Apple co-founder the most innovative leader in business today. Each principle is backed with research, quotes, and first-person interviews with experts and business leaders, as well as specific ideas for applying those principles to every business, large or small.

The Art of Negotiating the Best Deal

The course is organized around a mnemonic device, developed by Professor Freeman, that can serve in any negotiation situation. Called "I FORESAW IT," this indispensable framework guides you in assembling the strongest possible case, showing you how to evaluate such factors as creative options, independent criteria, and your best alternative to a negotiated agreement.

Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers: The Acclaimed Guide to Stress, Stress-Related Diseases, and Coping - Now Revised and Updated

Now in a third edition, Robert M. Sapolsky's acclaimed and successful Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers features new chapters on how stress affects sleep and addiction, as well as new insights into anxiety and personality disorder and the impact of spirituality on managing stress. As Sapolsky explains, most of us do not lie awake at night worrying about whether we have leprosy or malaria. Instead, the diseases we fear-and the ones that plague us now-are illnesses brought on by the slow accumulation of damage, such as heart disease and cancer.

A More Beautiful Question: The Power of Inquiry to Spark Breakthrough Ideas

In this groundbreaking book, journalist and innovation expert Warren Berger shows that one of the most powerful forces for igniting change in business and in our daily lives is a simple, underappreciated tool - one that has been available to us since childhood. Questioning - deeply, imaginatively, "beautifully" - can help us identify and solve problems, come up with game-changing ideas, and pursue fresh opportunities. So why are we often reluctant to ask "Why?"

Publisher's Summary

George Friedman, founder of Stratfor, has become a leading expert in geopolitical forecasting, sought after for his thoughtful assessments of current trends and near-future events.

In The Next 100 Years, Friedman turns his eye on the future. Drawing on a profound understanding of history and geopolitical patterns dating back to the Roman Empire, he shows that we are now, for the first time in half a millennium, experiencing the dawn of a new historical cycle.

What the Critics Say

"A unique combination of cold-eyed realism and boldly confident fortune-telling....Whether all of the visions in Friedman's crystal ball actually materialize, they certainly make for engrossing entertainment." (Publishers Weekly)

Though this book has taken much flak from readers (and will no doubt get a lot wrong as the decades roll forward), I thought the first half was smartly argued. Friedman attempts to forecast the next century through his "history as a chess game" theory, which postulates that in global politics, as in chess, there may seem to be a limitless number of potential moves, but, in actuality, only a few are feasible at a given time. Thus, leaders are heavily constrained in their options by geopolitical trends, economic cycles, demographic changes, and the moves made by other countries. Major shifts are driven less by the issues making the headlines at a given moment, and more by slow, long-term trends that build for years.

It's a simple (and perhaps simplistic) thesis, but Friedman uses it to generate some predictions that I found difficult to argue with. Consider:

* The US will remain the world's dominant military, economic, and cultural superpower for decades to come, if only because no one else will be capable of filling those shoes. And because no one else has such a powerful navy.* China's spectacular present-day growth story will wane as the country suffers from underlying economic and demographic problems. Friedman draws parallels to Japan's apparent preeminence in the 1980s, and subsequent economic meltdown.* Russia will struggle to assert itself, but will come apart* Turkey will become the dominant Middle Eastern power* As birthrates slow worldwide, industrialized countries will recruit immigrants, rather than seek to keep them out* The boundaries between the US and Mexico will blur, as Mexico gains economic power and parts of the US southwest become increasingly Mexican in culture

However, I think the chess game analogy holds up only so far into the future, and the crystal ball becomes a lot shakier in part two. I'll give Friedman credit for doing his homework on future military technology (I happen to work at one the DARPA companies that gets a quick mention), but the elaborate narrative he sets up about a 2050 space and ground war between a Turkey-Japan alliance and the United States can only be read as entertaining sci-fi speculation, not a credible forecast of reality. And some of Friedman's general assumptions make less sense than others. For example, he speaks a lot of "historic enemies" when describing potential conflicts -- while I'm sure that serious wars won't go away, I have a difficult time believing that modern states will be anywhere near as likely to mobilize their citizens for large-scale conflicts with other states as they were in the 19th and 20th centuries, especially when those citizens will have many ways of communicating with each other directly. (Then again, I'm not Polish -- maybe they do worry about being overrun once again by Germany or Russia?)

Finally, there are a lot of subjects that Friedman just doesn't touch very much. How will technology change the picture? Could something like Kurzweil's "Singularity" unfold, with implications so sweeping and profound that they make all existing schools of thought, including geopolitics, obsolete? Consider the advances in computers and computer systems between 1970 and now, then think ahead to 2050. What happens to economies when robots take over a lot of jobs? And what about climate change, medicine, DNA engineering, religion, food and water shortages, and so forth? Or the unpredictable but game-changing factors that always occur in an increasingly complex world?

All in all, definitely worth a read for futurists, but not the only work you should have on your shelf.

Good start and good topic over all. The main problem was that it dragged on towards the last third..... and the length made it hard for me to keep all the interconnected pieces together in my head. Probably could have been cut down a bit IMHO.

This month Bryan Alexander has a terrific article out " Apprehending the Future: Emerging Technologies, from Science Fiction to Campus Reality" in Educause Review Alexander writes about the various methods that we try to understand the future, where Friedman is about scenarios rather then methods. 100 years may seem too far to look ahead, the but the exercise of looking towards the future is one of the best ways we have to understand where we are today. I'd like to see the 100 year lens applied to education and technology. Friedman is all about looking at the next 100 years of geopolitics, of war, and somewhat of the economy.

I have some agreement with Friedman in terms of a coming labor shortage and the massive consequences of a rapidly aging society. I'm not sure if Poland will become the major power that Friedman predicts (but I do agree about Turkey). A fun book to get lost in, a good read for any of us who enjoy predicting the future in our own little worlds.

Starts out fairly interesting, but after a while, the assumptions are built into a house of cards that just can't sustain the author's conclusions. While the author seems to have a good grasp of military history, he's significantly less clear on economic issues.

Unlike many "futurist" tomes, Friedman's objective analysis of wide ranging events processed within the framework of geopolitical thinking, shines through once again in this positively engrossing book. I would encourage the reader/listener to set aside any preconceived notions they might have, and listen carefully to Friedman's thought process.

As the author emphasizes many times, the leaders of any nation are faced with an extremely narrow range of options with which to secure their nation's vital interests. This drives their decision making in ways that are seldom captured effectively by the media or political spin doctors. Check your biases at the door and you will not only learn why international events transpire in the ways that they do, but how to assess and analyze how national transformations and conflicts will likely unfold in the future.

Friedman's writing style is excellent, and I found this particular audiobook to be particularly well narrated by Mr. Hughes. Highly recommended to anyone interested in current/future events.

I listened to the first two hours and then started to skip forward but it did not seem to get any better. I have bought many books from Blackstone Audiobooks and they have all been good or very good. These predictions of the future did nothing to spark my imagination and were generally uninteresting. I have about 30 books in my wish list and I had to spend a credit on this.

Friedman offers us a prognostication of the future 100 years. His fortunetelling is based upon geopolitical factors rather than hocus-pokus or astrogeology. He offers very sound reasons for his thinking the future history lines. Given that this book was published in 2010 and only four years into it, we already see some seeds of truth. Four years is only 1/25 of the span but at least he is off to a great start. Given this a listen, it will make you think -- especially about the middle east and the far east. I give it a thumbs up.

Again, Friedman gives us his best shot (a good one) regarding the tendencies of a populated planet. Sweeping and at the same time humble in his assessments, the reader senses responsible opinions and, as such, they are acceptable and absorbable into his own frame of reference. In other words, the book is quite excellent.

Friedman was the founder of Statfor, a fact that he shys away from in this book. Sratfor gathers intelligence, through a geopolitical perspective, and then provides said intelligence for Fortune 500 companies, U.S. government, and private companies. So, don't feel like this is just another nutjob with a laptop and a world map. All in all, i feel like this is at least interesting, and stimulates the brain cells. I feel like, he may have a few of the details off, but he's on the right track. An amazing book, and eye-opening when so many of us are caught in the day to day news source from liberal media giants, like CNN, and conservative propagandists like Fox. Definately, a good choice.

In this book Friedman lays out an interpretation of world history (mainly modern history), adds in some currently known facts and statistics and then extrapolates this model forward to describe the drivers for world events in the near future.

As Friedman admits, this is shamelessly, uncompromisingly and sometimes almost offensively pro-US -but (if you can) set this aside this there are a number of interesting conclusions drawn about the driving causes for key events in world history. These conclusions are then joined and scenarios for the future are constructed and presented in a concise and flowing manner.

I liked this book. While I might like to question his interpretation of some historical events and even though many individual facts, forecasts and conclusions were not new to me, Friedman finds patterns and extends them into the future in a logical and consistent manner which I have not seen elsewhere and I found thought provoking. I shall be looking for other similar books to add to my library.

Definately worth listening to.

4 of 4 people found this review helpful

David

Loughton, United Kingdom

9/5/11

Overall

"The next 100 years as it applies to the USA"

This book reminded me of those American war films where no other allies were involved in WW2 or mattered much. The writer presents statistics to forecast how the world during next 100 years will be dominating by the US even more than in the second half of the 20th century. Only two years after publication (2009) we see that as an unlikely scenario, due in part to the colossal US debts that threaten to engulf it. I was amazed the writer also seems to dismiss China as some kind of 'passing phase'........ Mmmmm I don't think so. In summary: written by an American purely for Americans presumably to cheer them up.

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

Darren

United Kingdom

4/11/15

Overall

Performance

Story

"Insightful and interesting"

Of course the author rightly points out that the details are not necessarily correct but the view of what might happen on a wider scale is very interesting. You really have to not see the book as an exact timeline but more as a guild to possible problems and solutions for us in the next 100 years.

0 of 0 people found this review helpful

John

Leeds, United Kingdom

12/6/14

Overall

Performance

Story

"Fun and thought provoking"

Any additional comments?

George Friedman provide the listener with his predictions on the course of international relations over the next hundred years. He begins by setting out the forces that he thinks shape world politics and then outlines how he expects events to progress. There is humor in this as well as serious ideas. Well worth reading, even if to define in your own mind, why you think he might be wrong.

0 of 0 people found this review helpful

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